236 THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE SEA 



to the proposal of forming the society on very much the 

 original plan, and their opposition, perhaps partly from the 

 presence of Charles at the conferences, was beginning to give 

 way. They had been told, too, in answer to some of their 

 objections, that while it was the king's intention to maintain 

 existing rights, all their liberties depended wholly upon the 

 king's grace, and he had expressed his purpose that his Council 

 in both kingdoms should advise them in anything that required 

 further consideration. It was much to be desired, they were 

 told, that his Majesty's clear intentions should prevail with 

 them as they had done with the English commissioners, not 

 to question, but to advance and settle so needful a work. 1 



Charles himself came forward to help them with an alter- 

 native plan to that of the "reserved waters." The ground 

 upon which the claim to the latter was based had gradually 

 shifted. The initial argument that the surrounding seas per- 

 tained to Scotland as an independent kingdom that they 

 were the "seas of Scotland" had been disposed of by the 

 declaration that the right to the sea and to its fisheries was 

 a prerogative of the crown; and it could not be denied that 

 though no union of the kingdoms had taken place, there 

 certainly had been union of the crowns. The question of the 

 prerogative was a thorny one, which the Scottish commissioners 

 had to avoid; and the claim to the reserved waters was now 

 made solely on behalf of the poor inhabitants of certain parts 

 of the coast, who subsisted mainly by their fishing in the sea, 

 and would, it was said, be reduced to poverty and indigence 

 unless these waters were reserved for their exclusive use. To 

 meet this objection, Coke proposed a resolution at one of the 

 meetings that the king should be asked to lay down a regula- 

 tion to guard against interference with the poor fishermen at 

 the places where the fishing of the company would be carried 

 on, and at the next meeting a draft in the king's handwriting, 

 perhaps laid on the table by Charles himself, was read as 

 follows : " The English commissioners desire to take away 

 all showes of wordes that may show diffidence between the 

 two nations, and hauing heard that the Scots commissioners 

 are to desire some places to be reserved from the company or 

 association, it is conceived this to be the fitter way: That 



1 State Papers, Dom., ccvi. 50. 



